Stakeholders’ Sentiment During Mattel’s “Wicked” Dolls Debacle

Chapter one provides a clear outline of different engaging steps in current research. This chapter includes the background of the study, research objectives, problem statements, and operational definitions used in the research study. This chapter gives a comprehensive study of how the research is going to be conducted and it will engage the reader to move to the next chapter. Moreover, it was known that the purpose of the research was to identify the role of effective communication by the Police department of Abu Dhabi and its effectiveness in crisis management while simultaneously identifying the different barriers faced by the police force in applying effective communication in times of crisis. Chapter two has reviewed the previous literature on the importance of effective communication in crisis management. Also, the communication approach is used to deal with crises. Next, reviewed Important Constructs in Effective Communication for the team. The theoretical review looks at attribution, situational and image repair theory. The empirical review has considered the objectives of the study. On the role of channels of communication in crisis management, the study has considered a review of literature in the role of traditional and social media during crisis management. Considering barriers to effective communication in crisis management, the literature review considers technological, organizational, and social barriers to effective communication in crisis management. The last objective presents a new model that should be considered by organizations for effective communication in crisis management. From the review of the literature, no research has already been done on the role of effective communication during crisis management specifically. This creates a research gap that needs to be considered. Therefore, there is a need for this research study to identify the importance of effective communication during crisis management in the Police Department of Abu Dhabi. Chapter three has provided a clear breakdown of various steps in which the researcher engages in conducting the interview. The aspects of sampling, data collection methods, research design, data analysis, instruments, and ethical considerations have been well discussed in this chapter.

This exploratory study was born in order to identify the potential and effectiveness of social media in crisis management in the Ecuadorian university. To do this, a qualitative-quantitative approach methodology is developed, which takes as a case study the Private Technical University of Loja, UTPL. The fieldwork is divided into three stages: in the first, four in-depth interviews are carried out with directors of the Institution, to know the institutional vision on crisis management of the HEIs; in the second, through direct observation and documentary analysis, the strategic approach to digital communication is determined; and, in the third, an analysis of four variables (presence, activity, participation and engagement) of the institutional social networks, Facebook and Instagram, is carried out, in order to determine the strategy and management of digital communication in the first year (2020 ) of COVID-19 in the country. The results allow identifying, in the first instance, the view of managers on crisis management and communication. Subsequently, the dynamics of digital communication of crisis is made visible, and finally, the potentialities offered by digital communication in crisis management with university audiences, specifically students and prospects (millennials and centennials) during the research period, become apparent.

The objective of this research was to examine the attitude and responses of the general publics towards a situation crisis communication management which related to a political situation in Thailand. The attitude variable in this study focused on attitudes into crisis communication management in content and the statement release, management of time during the crisis, attitude towards the crisis communication management, and suitable and appropriately management. Meanwhile, the responses variable focused on responses into favorability and credibility, frequently of using the service after the crisis, ways of showing support, movement to boycott, and royalty towards a brand after the crisis. The study was conducted by the quantitative method with data collection from the survey from two-hundreds Thai general publics who aware of the situation of crisis during the first semester of 2021 academic year. The results indicated that an appropriate crisis communication management results in somewhat positive attitude which leads to positivity in the general publics’ responses towards brand after the crisis communication management. Furthermore, majority of the general publics somewhat agree that they overlooked the crisis situation that happened because they are focus on the price, service, and promotion. The findings in this study contributed to crisis communication practitioners as a basic insight of the genral publics’ attitude and responses towards the Foodpanda’s case of crisis communication.�

South Africa has several car manufacturing companies or plants, referred to as open systems. Due to their nature as open systems, crises are inevitable. Crises have the potential of inducing grave consequences for the organisation’s reputation and, ultimately, its survival. Being prone to conflicting situations necessitates that each organisation have an effective crisis management plan that details the crisis management and crisis communication steps in great detail. However, implementation of crisis communication and crisis management always comes with challenges for the crisis management teams. Increasingly, in the car manufacturing industry, car recalls are being made as certain models tend to have potentially fatal defects. This increase in car recalls is the reason behind the development of this qualitative study. Therefore, the researcher undertook a case study approach, utilising semi-structured interviews to obtain the required data. The value of qualitative research lies in its ability to provide answers to the questions ‘why’ and ‘how.’ Thus, broadening the understanding of crisis management as a phenomenon and the experiences and feelings of the crisis management teams at car manufacturing companies. The research participants were four car manufacturing companies (Companies A, B, C and D) with their head offices in Gauteng, South Africa. The crisis management teams were selected as the target population because they actively attempt to remedy the crises and interact with various organisational stakeholders when a crisis situation occurs. The findings identified gaps in crisis communication planning and implementation, given the ever-changing business and public relations environments in which organisations operate. As a result, the researcher made recommendations that will assist public relations and communications practitioners today and in the future to handle various crises effectively in the motor industry. Ultimately, car manufacturing companies will benefit by improving the protection of their organisations and their stakeholders from reputational and livelihood threats and further reducing those threats’ negative impacts.

This research aimed to identify Indonesian National Police (Polri) strategy in carrying out image restoration in the Ferdy Sambo case. The case of Ferdy Sambo attracted substantial public attention throughout the end of 2022 because it involved members of the National Police in criminal acts. This incident undermined the image and reputation of the National Police as a state apparatus whose function is to maintain security and order. Furthermore, the case of Ferdy Sambo has implications for a communication crisis along with reports in the media that involve many parties as sources so that it brings speculation on the image of the Police. A communication strategy to restore the image was required in crisis communication management, especially in the early period of the crisis in order to maintain the organization's reputation. This research used a qualitative approach with qualitative content analysis as the method. This study used William Benoit's strategy formulation as divided image restoration strategies into five categories: "Denial, Evading Responsibility, Reducing offensiveness of events, Corrective action, and Mortification". The findings showed that the Polri image restoration strategy at the beginning of the Ferdy Sambo case was reducing the offensiveness of the event which consisted of bolstering followed by corrective action, while the combination of strategies practice was bolstering, differentiation, compensation, and corrective action in the post-initial case. The image restoration strategy used in the clarification meeting with Commission III of the DPR RI was to assume the crisis as an accident, bolstering, corrective action and mortification. This study found another strategy in the data as the trait of the qualitative content analysis required interpretation, apart from the strategy described by Benoit, namely hierarchical power at the beginning of the crisis, authoritative support in the post-crisis beginning and continuous improvement in the clarification meeting with Commission III of the DPR RI. The organization's power relations with the public and stakeholders determine the rhetoric and various strategies in crisis communication.

The end goal of technological advancement used in crisis response and recovery is to prevent, reduce or mitigate the impact of a crisis, thereby enhancing sustainable recovery. Advanced technological approaches such as social media, machine learning (ML), social network analysis (SNA), and big data are vital to a sustainable crisis management decisions and communication. This study selects 28 articles via a systematic process that focuses on ML, SNA, and related technological tools to understand how these tools are shaping crisis management and decision making. The analysis shows the significance of these tools in advancing sustainable crisis management to support decision making, information management, communication, collaboration and cooperation, location-based services, community resilience, situational awareness, and social position. Moreover, the findings noted that managing diverse outreach information and communication is increasingly essential. In addition, the study indicates why big data and language, cross-platform support, and dataset lacking are emerging concerns for sustainable crisis management. Finally, the study contributes to how advanced technological solutions effectively affect crisis response, communication, decision making, and overall crisis management.

Organizational interventions and strategies for COVID-19 pandemic management in acute care setting: A qualitative interview study with nurse leaders in German hospitals

The pervasive influence of social media has transformed individuals from passive consumers of information into creators and disseminators of content, reshaping the dynamics of global communication and information sharing. Individuals now have the power to share their opinions, grievances, and experiences with broad audiences, almost immediately. When customers are dissatisfied with a brand, they can now harness the immense reach of social media to express their criticisms and direct their dissatisfaction towards organisations. This rapid and uncontrollable spread of negative information can escalate into organisational crises. Consequently, organisations must understand how to effectively manage and mitigate the far-reaching impact of crises in the realm of social media. One of the most significant aspects of this evolving landscape is the power of social media users with substantial followings, often referred to as social media influencers. These influencers possess the unique capacity to significantly shape the emotional responses of online users, especially during crises, where their role in framing crises becomes pivotal. During a crisis, social media influencers often accelerate the spread of negative content, intensifying attacks on organisations. They have the power to magnify or diminish the gravity and consequences of a crisis. Considering the crucial role that influencers play in framing crises and shaping public opinion, it becomes increasingly vital to gain a nuanced understanding of their diverse impact in crisis contexts. Moreover, a complex interplay exists between influencers and the brands embroiled in a crisis. This intricate dynamic illustrates a reciprocal influence, whereby both influencers and affected brands impact each other. Hence, it is also important for influencers to understand how their reaction to an organisational crisis can impact upon their own brands. Traditional crisis communication approaches have been heavily focused on public media and traditional forms of content dissemination. However, organisations must now adapt their crisis communication strategies to effectively navigate crises as they rapidly unfold on social media. Aligning crisis management approaches with the unique characteristics of social media becomes paramount in mitigating the unfavourable consequences of online crises on organisational reputation. To gain a comprehensive understanding of the dynamics surrounding social media crises, this thesis focuses on scandals as a specific crisis type and encompasses two sequential studies, starting with exploratory work and moving to more causal experimentation. Study One employs content analysis across multiple cases, involving both for-profit and not-for-profit organisations affected by value-based versus performance-based scandals. Study One utilises a combination of qualitative and quantitative data within an interpretivist framework to facilitate a comprehensive understanding of how scandals can spread on social media. Study One underscores the impacts of influencers and their tone valences on the spread of different types of scandals pertaining to for-profit and not-for-profit organisations. It reveals that the role of influencers in online crisis discussions is contingent upon the nature of the crisis and the specific organisations involved. Study Two utilises an experimental design and explores how the interplay between the factors initially examined in the first study influences a scandal situation. Study Two investigates how these factors shape the public’s perceptions and behavioural intentions concerning the organisation affected by a scandal. It shows that online users’ reactions to the organisational scandal and influencers’ voices are affected by the types of influencers, the tone valence they adopt, and the type of organisation involved in the scandal. This thesis contributes to the existing literature on crisis communication and online reputation management. It extends the Situational Crisis Communication Theory (Coombs & Holladay, 2002) by illuminating the influence of organisational types on crisis situations and Social Mediated Crisis Communication Model (Austin et al., 2012) by addressing how various types of self-involved influencers, each employing different approaches represented by their tone valences, influence the dynamics of an online scandal.

This paper presents results from a comparative and qualitative discourse-historical analysis of governmental crisis communication in Austria, Germany, France, Hungary and Sweden, during the global COVID-19 pandemic lockdown from March 2020 to May 2020 (a ‘discourse strand’). By analysing a sample of important speeches and press conferences by government leaders (all performing as the ‘face of crisis management’), it is possible to deconstruct a range of discursive strategies announcing/legitimising restrictive measures in order to cope with the COVID-19 pandemic where everybody is in danger of falling ill, regardless of their status, position, education and so forth. I focus on four frames that have been employed to mitigate the ‘dread of death’ (Bauman, 2006) and counter the ‘denial of death’ (Becker, 1973/2020): a ‘religious frame’, a ‘dialogic frame’, a frame emphasising ‘trust’, and a frame of ‘leading a war’. These interpretation frameworks are all embedded in ‘renationalising’ tendencies, specifically visible in the EU member states where even the Schengen Area was suddenly abolished (in order to ‘keep the virus out’) and borders were closed. Thus, everybody continues to be confronted with national biopolitics and body politics (Wodak, 2021).

Courses: Crisis Communication, Crisis and Issue Management, Writing for Public Relations, Public Relations Capstone. Objective: This unit activity refines traditional simulation activities used in crisis communication education. By partnering with crisis management professionals and developing localized, multi-stage scenarios grounded in the university context, students learn to 1) create a single communication voice; 2) curb social media rumors; and 3) leverage the symbiotic partnership between the press and PR during times of crisis.

This chapter presents results from a comparative and qualitative discourse-historical analysis of governmental crisis communication in Austria, Germany, France, Hungary and Sweden, during the global COVID-19 pandemic lockdown from March 2020 to May 2020 (a 'discourse strand'). By analysing a sample of important speeches and press conferences by government leaders (all performing as the 'face of crisis management'), it is possible to deconstruct a range of discursive strategies announcing/legitimising restrictive measures in order to cope with the COVID-19 pandemic where everybody is in danger of falling ill, regardless of their status, position, education and so forth. I focus on four frames that have been employed to mitigate the 'dread of death' (Bauman, 2006) and counter the 'denial of death' (Becker, 1973/2020): a 'religious frame', a 'dialogic frame', a frame emphasising 'trust', and a frame of 'leading a war'. These interpretation frameworks are all embedded in 'renationalising' tendencies, specifically visible in the EU member states where even the Schengen Area was suddenly abolished (in order to 'keep the virus out') and borders were closed. Thus, everybody continues to be confronted with national biopolitics and body politics (Wodak, 2021).

This experiment used a counterbalanced, within-subjects design to assess two factors in crisis communication and reputation management: Defensive and apologetic responses to news stories and the effects of good and bad reputation. The dependent measures examined subjects' memory about the companies in the short and long term. Interaction effects ran counter to conventional wisdom abjuring the stonewall response. Subjects recalled fewer details about corporations with a bad reputation that apologized. However, a positive reputation reinforced by an apologetic response resulted in stronger ability to recall details. Reputation appears to be a powerful force in subsequent attributions about other aspects of the organization. The power of reputation was evidenced by significant differences found as a function of reputation and response in a measure assessing defensiveness. Subjects did not, however, link response with the measure evaluating reputation. The interaction of reputation and response found here suggests that traditional strategies do not apply in all cases and certainly calls into question pat answers or formulaic principles such as: “Always apologize” or “Never Say No Comment.” Taking a relational approach, reputation is an ongoing index of previous responses to situations, making the most immediate response strategy a key element of that index, but also a response that should be made in light of current reputation.

The paper analyzes the behavior of business entities based in the Emirate of Dubai in the context of crisis communication responses by government institutions during the Dubai 2024 floods. The research aims to identify if there are key differentiating factors that influence the understanding of government crisis communications by businesses. Numerous literature sources indicate the importance of employee wellbeing policies for reducing crisis risks and hazards. A document analysis of public announcements of Dubai Government institutions, as well as responses, announcements, and policies of 69 companies operating in Dubai, has been performed to understand what and how the government communicated during the crisis, how companies behaved during the crisis, and what policies and procedures are in place in the companies. The crisis communication of the Dubai government and official authorities was proactive and in line with principles defined by the Situational Crisis Communication Theory. This resulted in the successful mitigation of the crisis risks and the timely restoration of the basic functioning of the city's critical infrastructure. At the same time, the crisis response of business entities was not univocal: some businesses decided to work remotely or temporarily cease their operations, while others decided to carry on with the “business as usual” approach, returning the employees to their workplaces quickly and putting them at risk. Findings of the research indicate that companies with a clear focus on employee wellbeing and developed health, safety, and environment policies were less involved in putting their employees at risk than companies that did not highlight employee wellbeing as one of their priorities. Further, the findings highlight the importance of employee wellbeing policies in crisis risk mitigation and contribute to the body of knowledge in terms of crisis communication, employee wellbeing, and emergency management.

Several crisis communication models can be applied in the discourse of man-made crises occurrence, such as terrorist attacks, cyber-attacks, or explosions caused by negligence and other similar events. However, one of the most comprehensive models in practical terms- and yet one of the least scientifically researched- is the Joint Information System (JIS) model. By nature, the resolution of such critical incidents, which are driven by human intention and action, requires the involvement of multiple actors, primarily state security institutions, as well as non-governmental organizations and possibly others. The JIS model thus provides a collaborative framework for crisis communication, involving multiple stakeholders, including government emergency responders, media representatives, community leaders and other actors depending on the type of incident. The JIS approach subsequently ensures that critical information dissemination is coordinated, consistent and effective in addressing the needs of all involved parties. The JIS model is based on five key principles: 1) Integrated communication, which requires collaboration among all stakeholders to ensure a unified message development and delivery, 2) Audience-focused communication, which prioritizes understanding the concerns and informational needs of different audiences to tailor messages accordingly, 3) Timely and accurate communication, which ensures that stakeholders receive reliable and up-to-date information throughout the various crisis phases, 4) Credible communication, which focuses on building trust and maintaining the credibility of information sources and 5) Continuous communication, which highlights the importance of sustained information-sharing in the precrisis stage and throughout both the crisis management and recovery phases. Recovery from a man-made crisis, including but not limited to terrorist incidents, is a complex and multifaceted process that encompasses physical, emotional, social, and economic dimensions. In the aftermath of such events, effective communication is crucial for maintaining public safety, disseminating critical information and mitigating the psychological and social impacts of the crisis on affected areas and citizens. This paper examines the application of the JIS model in man-made crisis scenarios, analysing its effectiveness in ensuring structured and transparent communication. The research employs a qualitative analysis of past crisis events where the JIS model has been implemented, drawing insights from case studies and best practices that are available online. The findings indicate that the JIS model significantly enhances crisis response by fostering coordination among stakeholders, reducing misinformation and improving public trust, consequently- maintaining reputational aspects of the state authorities high, that is one of the cornerstones of the successful crisis management. Overall, the JIS model is a highly effective approach to crisis communication, particularly in the context of man-made crises. By adhering to its principles, organizations can enhance their crisis management capabilities, minimize the adverse impacts on affected communities, and facilitate a more efficient recovery process.

PurposeThe use of social media in crisis communication is growing and spreading in an instantaneous speed. The social media technology enables immediate information sharing reaching millions of users on various social media platforms. This paper has gathered lessons learnt from the experiences of the Norfolk Fire and Rescue Service in the UK, the Oslo Police Operation Center in Norway, and from an extensive literature review on social media and crisis communication. This empirical and theoretical information was the basis of the 18 guidelines or “do’s” and “don’ts” on how to use social media in crisis communication. The purpose of this paper was to gather best practices that can help crisis managers when attempting to use social media as a crisis communication tool.Design/methodology/approachThe paper had two cases with semi-structured interviews with representatives from two crisis management organizations (Norfolk Fire and Rescue Service in the UK dealing with safety and Oslo Police Operation Center in Norwa dealing with security). The empirical data were complemented by documentary analysis of the most up-to-date articles on social media in crisis communication.FindingsThe paper provides empirical insights about how to use social media as a crisis communication tool. The two case studies provide different ways to use social media (one-way communication tool and as a two-way information share). This empirical and theoretical information was the basis of the 18 guidelines or “do’s” and “don’ts” on how to use social media in crisis communication. The “do’s” and “don’ts” are best practices that can help crisis managers when attempting to use social media as a crisis communication tool. Some of the main “do’s” include building a relationship with the public prior to a crisis; being courteous, honest and transparent; being factual, accurate and credible; being timely in your messages during a crisis, etc. Some of the main “don’ts” include do not speculate; do not post personal opinions; do not post anything that could bring the organization into disrepute etc.Research limitations/implicationsBecause of the chosen research approach with two case studies complemented by a literature review, the research results may lack generalizability. Therefore, researchers are encouraged to test the guidelines provided and to further find other case studies.Practical implicationsThe guidelines including 18 “do’s” and “don’ts” are best practices that can help crisis managers when attempting to use social media as a crisis communication tool.Originality/valueThis paper fulfills an identified need to study how social media technology can play a major role in the response efforts of the crisis management community during a crisis. It also reveals the potential of using social media as an “information harvesting” tool and a tool for “rumor management”.